OUR LADY OF GUADALUPE AND THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION

       OUR LADY OF GUADALUPE AND THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION

     The Blessed Virgin appeared to Juan Diego in 1531, less than 30 years after Columbus reached America.  At that time there were very few Spanish in Mexico.  The various Indian tribes who usually fought between themselves, were putting aside their tribal animosities and planning to drive the hated Spanish back into the sea.  The Spanish did not understand nor care about the Indian's culture.  They considered it to be heathenish and set about to destroy it.

     After the appearance of Our Lady of Guadalupe Indians came in droves to see her picture.  Thousands of them became Christians and were baptized.

     Why the change?  The Aztec original written language, like that of the Egyptians, was in the form of pictographs, small simple pictures symbolizing concepts.  The Indians read the picture left on Juan Diego's tilma in their own language.  They saw that:

     The woman wore a brooch with a cross on it.  Unmistakenly she belonged to the same religious belief as the Spanish who planted a cross wherever they set foot.

     She is greater than the sun or sun god because she blocks out the light of the sun, whose beams of light stream out from behind.

     She is using the moon as a footstool.  She is greater than the moon god who had to be appeased with the sacrifice of their best maidens and children.

     She is greater than the stars which she is using to decorate her mantle.

     But she is not a goddess!  Why?  Because her hands are folded in the Spanish form of prayer, a supplication to someone greater than herself.  A goddess does not give homage to other gods!

     The way her hair is combed, the way her sash is worn and the symbols on her garment had meaning for the Indians.  One told them that she was a maiden, another that she was the mother of one son.  They accepted the virgin birth of her child before it had ever been preached to them.

     Why should she be known as Our Lady of Guadalupe?  Guadalupe was a small town in Spain.  The only thing which might have set it apart from other similar towns was a woodcarver who carved crude statues of the Blessed Virgin.  Many of the Spanish in Mexico carried these small wooden statues with them.  If the Indians wished to called the Blessed Virgin Our Lady of Guadalupe it was all right with the Spanish.  To them the whole thing was a miracle performed by God and no reason had to be given why she should be named after their crude little figures.

 

     It was earlier in our own 20th century that an American woman went to Mexico to study the remnant of the tribe to which Juan Diego belonged.  Very few still knew the language.  She discovered that the original name was not "Guadalupe" but an Indian expression so similar in phonics that the Spanish easily mistook it for "Guadalupe."  The Indian meaning was "she who was made without blemish."  A modern translator would call it "Immaculate Conception."

     The dogma of the Immaculate Conception was not defined by the Catholic church until more than three hundred years after the appearance of Our Lady of Guadalupe.  December 8th was picked to celebrate this feast day, just four days before the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe on December 12th.  These feasts coming so close together gives strength to our belief in Mary's instant and complete purity at the time of her birth.

     The North and South American continents are dedicated to Our Lady of Guadalupe.  The United States is dedicated to the Immaculate Conception.  Our Lady of the Lake parish is dedicated to Mary under the title of the Immaculate Conception.  Yet so many of us pay so little attention to this mystery that we know little about it.  It is proper that we spend more time in meditation upon it.